Winter is for the Birds

Tufted Titmouse

 

Searching for the next bite keeps the winter birds busy through the cold months of winter

 

And photographing the birds keeps cabin fever at bay for the wildlife enthusiast

Carolina Wren

 

Responsive Management recently conducted a study in Idaho.  Among their findings were the following:

 

90% value Idaho's wildlife, 90% approve of lawful hunting, 97% approve of lawful fishing.  35% participated in hunting, 53% participated in fishing while 78% reported that they had viewed or photographed wildlife around their homes over the past two years.  63% of respondents reported that they had taken trips of one mile or more to view or photograph wildlife. 

 

When queried about their intention in the coming two years 63% reported that they intended to make trips of a mile or more to view and/or photograph wildlife while 58% indicated that they would likely go fishing and 42% listed as likely to go hunting.

 

Wildlife viewing and photography is growing and wildlife managers are beginning to take notice.

 

 

 

Wildlife Population Perceptions

Recently as I thumbed through a Pennsylvania outdoor publication I was struck by the observations that contributors had made.  A number of hunters were questioned about their opinion of the recent changes to the Pa bear season format where extra days were added to the archery season, one day added to the firearms season with that being a Saturday opener to allow hunters more access without needing to take time away from work.  The comments were all positive and respondents generally felt there are too many bears in Pennsylvania and increased hunting opportunities posed no problem. 

Additionally in letters to the editor hunters decried the lack of deer.  One Pennsylvania legislator has even proposed a bill requiring a separate committee be appointed to oversee antlerless license allocation as the PGC has over harvested deer and apparently cannot be trusted to manage deer numbers.  Continuing to spot read I did not find one person expressing the opinion that Pennsylvania has enough deer let alone too many.

With those opinions in mind lets look at some numbers. 

During the 2010 hunting season 161,119 bear hunting licenses were sold.  Hunters bagged 3,090 bears during the hunting season.  However, during the same license year hunters took an estimated 316,240 deer; 122,930 antlered and 193,310 antlerless.  When comparing bear license to harvest one finds that less than two percent of bear hunters were successful.  However, when comparing the deer harvest of 316,240 deer against a total of over 800,000 licensed hunter yields a thirty seven percent success rate.

From a personal point of view, during 2011 I have seen deer nearly every day and photographed them innumerable times. During the same period I had just one bear encounter with a sow and three small cubs, and never a chance to fire the camera.  Yet those interviewed by the hunting publication generally agreed; Pa has too many bears when over 100 times more deer were harvested.  And guess what; We don't have any deer!

Kinda hard to figure

What were they Thinking?



In ground breaking action at the April meeting of the Pennsylvania Game Commission a number of new hunting opportunities was acted upon; Porcupine Season! Under the new season hunters can take porcupines from September 1st through March 31st with a daily bag limit of 6 and a field possession limit of 12.

Now I realize that porcupines cause a certain amount of damage to timber and the occasional wayward critter can do considerable damage to cabins and campers and I can understand the PGC not extending total protection to porcupines but a hunting season? Will we have large groups of hunters out trying to bag their “limit” of porcupines? How is the hunter supposed to carry his limit? (It could be fun to watch someone try though). I also noticed that all porcupine hunters are required to wear 250 sq. inches of fluorescent orange material so at least we won’t have to deal with many of hunters affording themselves of this “New hunting opportunity” shooting each other in mistake for a porcupine.

And then I wonder what our successful hunters will do with a bag limit of porcupines once they figure out how to find six and carry them home. Will they be used for table fare? Will the laws governing wanton waste apply to the porcupine if the successful sportsmen decide to chuck their trophies in the garbage at days end?

What were they thinking?



And then I read the news release farther.

Board Makes Other Changes To Seasons


“The Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners today gave final approval to a regulatory change to allow for the hunting of starlings, English sparrows, opossums, skunks, groundhogs and weasels during legal hunting hours of the spring gobbler season. The Game Commission staff noted that this change will increase opportunities for hunters pursuing these species without creating unacceptable conflicts with spring gobbler hunters” (PGC news release #045-11)

Ok so now you have it. Sportsmen dollars spent to rewrite regulations for spring gobbler season to allow hunters to pursue other species. Money well spent to keep the turkey season from conflicting with a starling hunter or another who finds the English sparrow to be his quarry of choice. And God forbid if turkey season would conflict with someone who just wanted a ‘possum for the family dinner table. We all know that you shouldn’t stand in the way of anyone wanting to kill a skunk or a groundhog any time or place. And last but not least; the weasel must be included in this list of vermin to be exterminated at every opportunity.

And then I think back to the last time I spotted a weasel, and I think, and I think, and I don’t recall. Through the haze of the years I do believe that I may have seen a weasel maybe once, maybe twice. That’s enough! They are out there! They are killers! Kill them! Don’t let any silly regulation stand in the way of Killing the Killers! 



WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?



If you haven’t seen enough of what they were thinking click here to see how they have decided to kill more of the acclimated elk in the Pennsylvania Elk tourist area.

Remnants of the Past

Remains of a beaver lodge

Nestled between two mountains the Meadow Grounds Lake is the only public lake in rural Fulton County Pennsylvania.  Built in the 1960's by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission on State Game lands #53 the 204 acre lake provides a place for those interested in an outdoor experience.  A hiking trail at the south end of the lake will take one to the scenic falls on Roaring Run.  Not an easy walk by any means but one well worth the trip.  The Meadow Grounds also attracts a number of waterfowl species during their spring migration as the birds stop here to rest and feed.  The lake was drawn down last fall in preparation for dam repairs scheduled for this spring.  The draw-down exposed areas that normally are submerged and in doing so exposed this area of branch littered shoreline which brought back memories from a time decades ago.

Back in the early 1980's I began fishing this lake using a small 12' Jon boat.  I didn't have a truck at the time so I transported the boat strapped to the top of my car. Not being able to afford an electric motor I made do with a set of oars as my sole source of propulsion.  At the time the lake was inhabited by a considerable population of beavers and it was always a pleasure to see one's head at the front of a V shaped wake.  Sometimes one would surface beside the boat giving a closeup view and other times they would startle me with a loud tail slap as they submerged in alarm at my presence.  Not only did the beavers add considerably to the outdoor experience but by building their lodges and storing branches underwater they provided structure which in turn improved the shoreline habitat for fish. 

In the late 1970's a young Mark Crowder was assigned to Fulton County as District Game Protector.  Mark is a man who not only hunts and traps but is also a man who hold a deep appreciation for the wild places and it's creatures.  As Game Protector he was sometimes called upon to deal with problem beavers, an assignment which usually is dealt with by killing the offending animals.  Realizing that there was a better way Mark began live trapping the animals and relocating them to the lake.  The lake is located in the midst of over 5,000 acres of Game Lands so here the beavers could make a home.  With the permission of the regional law enforcement supervisor he posted the lake prohibiting beaver trapping and thus created a spot where beavers could exist doing what beavers do without causing any harm by damming culverts, flooding roadways, or cutting any private landowners valuable trees.  In short it was a win win situation even to the extent of providing trapping opportunities for those beavers straying into the stream above or below the lake.

With the retirement of the LES came a replacement and with him came the decision that the lake could not be posted against beaver trapping.  State game lands are purchased and maintained by monies derived from the hunters and trappers and as such are open during any appropriate hunting or trapping season so the signs came down, the beavers were wiped out and only the remnants of their submerged cache and the memories of the good times when anyone could enjoy these unique animals at this tiny mountain lake remain. 

And this was done by a state agency in the name of Wildlife Conservation.

CWD Nearing Pennsylvania

A white-tailed deer harvested in Allegany County, Maryland during November of 2010 tested positive for Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD). This is the first confirmed case in Maryland. CWD was found in Hampshire County, West Virginia in 2005 and by 2009 45 cases had been confirmed. There is no doubt that CWD is moving our way and it’s only a matter of time before Pennsylvania will have its first confirmed case of the dreaded disease.

CWD belongs to a family of diseases know as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSE) caused by an abnormal form of a protein know as a prion. The symptoms are similar to scrapie in sheep and mad cow in cattle. All official web sites that I have visited state that there is no evidence that CWD affects humans while all caution those exposed to deer in contaminated areas take certain precautions.

The list of states and provinces where CWD has been detected continues to grow while many wildlife and agriculture departments have implemented plans and regulation in an attempt to limit the spread.

West Virginia DNR states that the disease does not cause and immediate widespread die-off of deer but if allowed to spread will cause long-term damage to the herd. It also notes that although the outcome of the disease is not known some have predicted it as a 30-50 year epidemic.



For more information on how the Pennsylvania intends to react click here to find the Chronic Wasting Response Plan. The plan is a framework to guide the state agencies as they attempt to monitor and control the spread of the disease.


I remember listening to retired Pennsylvania Game Protector Carl Jarrett recall the Game Commission’s reaction to a rabies epidemic early in his career possibly in the 1940’s. He told of how road killed deer were collected from across the state and processed into bait balls. A dose of poison was placed the bait which was then given to officers and employees. Their job was to saturation bait areas where rabies was thought to be present. This poisoning resulted in virtually all meat eating domestic and bird and wildlife exposed being killed in the attempt to eradicate rabies vector species.

During my time with the Commission we were once again faced with a rabies epidemic entering our state during the 1980’s. This time the actions taken were not nearly so extreme. Regulations were put in place requiring pet owners to vaccinate their pets. Other reasonable regulations and testing services were put in place to protect the public along with an awareness campaigns designed to teach the general public what to do in case they came in contact with a suspected rabid animal. The end result is that we have learned to live with rabies and wildlife population as well as humans have been affected very little; a much better response than the one that was tried during the earlier time.

I certainly hope that when CWD does enter our state that the governmental agencies will exercise appropriate restraint and not destroy our deer herd in their attempt to save it.

As some of you are aware the Pennsylvania Game Commission and the Unified Sportsmen of Pennsylvania have been embroiled in a dispute over the management of our white-tailed deer herd since the Commission changed the deer season structure to one of concurrent buck and doe hunting along with antler restrictions. The result of the change reduced deer numbers in many areas resulting in less agricultural crop damage, lower numbers of road kills and improved forest health while at the same time having a negative impact on hunter satisfaction.

I will not enter into the “Deer Wars” argument at this time but must point out that CWD and/or the reaction to it may make the current deer management dispute completely irrelevant.

Wildlife: Changing Uses

The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic, and aesthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania’s public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generation yet to come. As trustees of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people
Article 1, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution



The Pennsylvania Game Commission is responsible for managing all of Pennsylvania’s game and wildlife, specifically the birds and mammals of the commonwealth for all citizens. Historically the commission has been financed primarily by hunters and trappers dollars. With hunting and trapping supporting the operation of the agency the focus of the agency has been on managing and protecting those species which are hunted and trapped and promoting the consumptive use of these populations.

While hunter numbers have been on the decline in Pennsylvania for many years, non-consumptive users of wildlife are growing in leaps and bounds.

A visit to the 2005 National Survey on Recreation and the Environment offers some interesting insight comparing the number of wildlife users from 1994-95 to those in 2000-01.
· Visits to Nature Centers grew 34%
· Viewing Wildlife up 55%
· Viewing Birds increased 31%

Nationally (2000-01) 122.28 million persons visited nature centers, 95.26 million were identified as wildlife viewers and 69.26 million as bird viewers. Big game hunting trailed the non-consumptive users coming in with 17.79 million participants.

According to Southwick Associates, Inc, (2001 Pennsylvania’s Wildlife Action Plan, Version 1.0a) “watchable wildlife recreation generated twice the value of all cattle and beef produced by Pennsylvania’s farms.” “Watchable wildlife generated $70 million in state sales and income taxes, $87 million in federal taxes, and $962 million in retail sales”. “Watchable wildlife recreation supports almost 19,000 full and part-time jobs in Pennsylvania alone.”

The study goes on to note that “watchable wildlife recreation overwhelmingly benefits rural communities, often at times of the year when other income sources are low”. The economic activity calculated to have been generated from non-consumptive uses of wildlife was estimated at $1.9 billion, slightly behind hunting which was estimated to have generated $2.2 billion.

Another interesting statistic from this report states that an estimated 1 million persons in Pennsylvania hunted, 1.2 million fished, while 3.8 million were estimated to participate in recreation wildlife viewing, feeding and photography during 2001.

Please note; in my experience hunters, fishermen, and wildlife viewers are not necessarily different persons. In many cases one person could be counted in all three categories. As and example I would like to point out that I hunt, fish, and also view wildlife. By doing so I support the Pa Fish& Boat commission with my fishing license and boat registration dollars, the Pa Game Commission by purchasing a hunting license while at the same time I am also a non-consumptive user pursuing my wildlife photography interest.

A change in Pennsylvania’s wildlife management is much needed. As the trend in wildlife users moves from the tradition consumptive to non-consumptive, wildlife management should be moving towards providing a better quality wildlife viewing experience. That the wildlife agencies are doing a lot of their work well is evident in the fact that wildlife viewing is gaining in popularity because we do have wildlife to view. However for wildlife viewing be a satisfying experience wildlife cannot have been hunted to the point that its concern for survival causes it to flee at the slightest indication of human presence.

While hunting must remain as a tool for wildlife managers to control wildlife population and as a way to provide the public with consumptive outdoor recreational opportunities; it is time that the managers of the commonwealth’s wildlife manages the public lands and wildlife populations to better serve all of the citizens of the commonwealth. The focus of wildlife management must change to being one of providing a comprehensive outdoor experience upon our public lands instead of focusing primarily upon providing hunting opportunities with wildlife viewing/tourism as a sometimes unwelcome byproduct of the hunting industry.